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>As this point you've already lost everyone who doesn't already ready the same pamphlets you read and agree. Usage of the term "Whig history" is not confined a

>As this point you've already lost everyone who doesn't already ready the same pamphlets you read and agree. Usage of the term "Whig history" is not confined adherents of a particular ideology, and does not require one to have/not-have any particular set of beliefs to use it (other than believing that the history of some institution is not a story of progress).. In other words, it's not comparable to "comrade". >Appealing to this fact in a thread about cryptocurrency is beyond ironic. There's a subtext that you're missing here, which is that the political system doesn't work when voters don't understand the system, which is unlike most domains, which manage complexity effectively. For example, most people don't understand how microprocessors work. But this is addressed through an effective and spontaneous process of delegating responsibility. The political process differs in this respect. The delegation process is baked in, as a result of built-in mechanisms that actively resist change. This prevents the kind of readjustment that occurs in other institutions. Meanwhile, those affected by policy are a captive audience, which eliminates a major feedback mechanism that exists in market-based systems. These two factors result in the system as a whole not evolving toward greater efficacy. On the contrary, it has the potential to evolve toward greater exploitation. >Political power will flow from the arrangement of bits only when the arrangement of bits determines who controls overwhelming military force. And not a moment before. We'll see.

throwawayjava 9y ago
Like I said, feel free to keep talking like this. In fact, I encourage you to do so. > The political process differs in this respect. On this we agree. I don't see how layering software engineering on top of politics will ever simplify politics.
- Jabanga 9y ago
  I am referring to the state-backed political process, not the general variety of politics one sees in private institutions. The former is qualitatively different from other institutions in our society.
  - throwawayjava 9y ago
    > political process If you cannot implement people's political preferences in your contract language, then your contract language will not be used for anything of substantive governmental or political importance unless you have the guns needed to impose your crypto-dictatorship. If you can implement people's political preferences in your contract language, and your contract language is used for political or governmental purposes, then people's political preferences will be codified -- as far as possible -- in your contract language. Which means that in order to participate in governance, people will have to understand both their preferences and also the contract programming language and its underlying runtime. Being an active citizen becomes strictly more difficult. To be very clear about it, people's preferences will not have changed. Consensus will remain a messy, complicated web of compromises that are difficult to reason about and implement via judge, let along codify for a computer. And all of this won't even achieve your political motives, unless you're planning on building some sort of anti-Whig-ideology static analysis into your contract language, I guess. (Which, frankly, I hope you do, because that would be kind of funny and cool.)
    - Jabanga 9y ago
      >If you cannot implement people's political preferences in your contract language, then your contract language will not be used for anything of substantive governmental or political importance unless you have the guns needed to impose your crypto-dictatorship. Can you elaborate on this? I don't understand the reasoning behind this. Why do smart contracts have to implement political ideologies in order to have a substantive impact on the world? Why can't they have an impact by raising the cost of legal enforcement of over-reaching tax mandates and regulatory restrictions, and of mass-surveillance, and thus shifting the balance of power between the individual and the state, toward the individual?
      - throwawayjava 9y ago
        > I don't understand the reasoning behind this. > Why do smart contracts have to implement political ideologies in order to have a substantive impact on the world? They don't. The can -- and almost certainly will -- remain primarily a speculative investment vehicle for technophile speculators and occasional currency for black markets. Maybe, even probably, crypto-currencies will turn out to be useful technological tool for some non-speculative businesses as well. However, you claimed: >>> Societies have gradually grown more unfair as the political system has strained under their growing complexity... This opens the door to manipulation by demagogues and special interests I'm simply responding to that claim. > Why can't they have an impact by raising the cost of legal enforcement of over-reaching tax mandates and regulatory restrictions Because -- believe it or not -- some people actually approve of some or all of those mandates and regulations. This idea that regulation and taxation is an objective negative result of a broken process is impressive self-delusion. Not everyone shares you political preferences or beliefs. Your political beliefs are not objective moral truth. So. Why in god's name would people who disagree with you agree to use a system that actively undermines their genuine political preferences?
kasey_junk 9y ago
> Usage of the term "Whig history" is not confined adherents of a particular ideology, and does not require one to have/not-have any particular set of beliefs to use it While this is true, outside of some specialized historical critique fields the most common usages of this term are in forums/literature of the libertarian and free market anarchist bent. In those places its a short hand for the idea that government as currently practiced in the west is clearly bloated and corrupt beyond repair, and the only reason every doesn't agree is that they are bamboozled by some Polly-Anna version of history. That statement is not clear and needs further backing up to many of us, who do not subscribe to the "Whig History" model but also don't think governments are objectively bad in all instances. Whether you knew that subtext or not, you used the term in the same way, to argue a similar philosophy, so it's not at all surprising that someone called you on it.
- Jabanga 9y ago
  >While this is true, outside of some specialized historical critique fields the most common usages of this term are in forums/literature of the libertarian and free market anarchist bent. I didn't know that. I haven't seen this term associated with libertarian thought.
sharemywin 9y ago
How are bitcoin or ethereum not highly resistant to change. Explain to me how you would go about changing either of those protocols? And yes there are lots of altcoins but ethereum very quickly is going to replace a good chunk of how things are transacted. And a non-profit without some kind of policy for baked in leadership change sounds a lot like a dictatorship to me.
- Jabanga 9y ago
  By design, they enshrine the rights of the individual participant to freely interact in a free market, by preventing the majority from creating any rules to limit access to the platform. So they don't have the same need to adapt as an interventionist government, that imposes itself on the economy through majority dictate, does. In the case of Ethereum, the Turing Completeness also makes it so that each contract is like a government in and of itself, which any party is free to design to meet their own preferences.
  - bloominglotus 9y ago
    Do you remember when the majority hard-forked, changed history, and restored millions of ether to DAO? Is that not blatantly a majority imposing themselves on the economy through majority dictate?
    - Jabanga 9y ago
      I don't believe such hard forks will be practical when the ecosystem is larger and more diverse. The DAO happened in a unique point in Ethereum's history, when the community was very small (and thus cohesive) and activity on the network was very little.

throwawayjava 9y ago

Like I said, feel free to keep talking like this. In fact, I encourage you to do so. > The political process differs in this respect. On this we agree. I don't see how layering software engineering on top of politics will ever simplify politics.

Jabanga 9y ago
I am referring to the state-backed political process, not the general variety of politics one sees in private institutions. The former is qualitatively different from other institutions in our society.
- throwawayjava 9y ago
  > political process If you cannot implement people's political preferences in your contract language, then your contract language will not be used for anything of substantive governmental or political importance unless you have the guns needed to impose your crypto-dictatorship. If you can implement people's political preferences in your contract language, and your contract language is used for political or governmental purposes, then people's political preferences will be codified -- as far as possible -- in your contract language. Which means that in order to participate in governance, people will have to understand both their preferences and also the contract programming language and its underlying runtime. Being an active citizen becomes strictly more difficult. To be very clear about it, people's preferences will not have changed. Consensus will remain a messy, complicated web of compromises that are difficult to reason about and implement via judge, let along codify for a computer. And all of this won't even achieve your political motives, unless you're planning on building some sort of anti-Whig-ideology static analysis into your contract language, I guess. (Which, frankly, I hope you do, because that would be kind of funny and cool.)
  - Jabanga 9y ago
    >If you cannot implement people's political preferences in your contract language, then your contract language will not be used for anything of substantive governmental or political importance unless you have the guns needed to impose your crypto-dictatorship. Can you elaborate on this? I don't understand the reasoning behind this. Why do smart contracts have to implement political ideologies in order to have a substantive impact on the world? Why can't they have an impact by raising the cost of legal enforcement of over-reaching tax mandates and regulatory restrictions, and of mass-surveillance, and thus shifting the balance of power between the individual and the state, toward the individual?
    - throwawayjava 9y ago
      > I don't understand the reasoning behind this. > Why do smart contracts have to implement political ideologies in order to have a substantive impact on the world? They don't. The can -- and almost certainly will -- remain primarily a speculative investment vehicle for technophile speculators and occasional currency for black markets. Maybe, even probably, crypto-currencies will turn out to be useful technological tool for some non-speculative businesses as well. However, you claimed: >>> Societies have gradually grown more unfair as the political system has strained under their growing complexity... This opens the door to manipulation by demagogues and special interests I'm simply responding to that claim. > Why can't they have an impact by raising the cost of legal enforcement of over-reaching tax mandates and regulatory restrictions Because -- believe it or not -- some people actually approve of some or all of those mandates and regulations. This idea that regulation and taxation is an objective negative result of a broken process is impressive self-delusion. Not everyone shares you political preferences or beliefs. Your political beliefs are not objective moral truth. So. Why in god's name would people who disagree with you agree to use a system that actively undermines their genuine political preferences?

kasey_junk 9y ago

> Usage of the term "Whig history" is not confined adherents of a particular ideology, and does not require one to have/not-have any particular set of beliefs to use it While this is true, outside of some specialized historical critique fields the most common usages of this term are in forums/literature of the libertarian and free market anarchist bent. In those places its a short hand for the idea that government as currently practiced in the west is clearly bloated and corrupt beyond repair, and the only reason every doesn't agree is that they are bamboozled by some Polly-Anna version of history. That statement is not clear and needs further backing up to many of us, who do not subscribe to the "Whig History" model but also don't think governments are objectively bad in all instances. Whether you knew that subtext or not, you used the term in the same way, to argue a similar philosophy, so it's not at all surprising that someone called you on it.

Jabanga 9y ago
>While this is true, outside of some specialized historical critique fields the most common usages of this term are in forums/literature of the libertarian and free market anarchist bent. I didn't know that. I haven't seen this term associated with libertarian thought.

sharemywin 9y ago

How are bitcoin or ethereum not highly resistant to change. Explain to me how you would go about changing either of those protocols? And yes there are lots of altcoins but ethereum very quickly is going to replace a good chunk of how things are transacted. And a non-profit without some kind of policy for baked in leadership change sounds a lot like a dictatorship to me.

Jabanga 9y ago
By design, they enshrine the rights of the individual participant to freely interact in a free market, by preventing the majority from creating any rules to limit access to the platform. So they don't have the same need to adapt as an interventionist government, that imposes itself on the economy through majority dictate, does. In the case of Ethereum, the Turing Completeness also makes it so that each contract is like a government in and of itself, which any party is free to design to meet their own preferences.
- bloominglotus 9y ago
  Do you remember when the majority hard-forked, changed history, and restored millions of ether to DAO? Is that not blatantly a majority imposing themselves on the economy through majority dictate?
  - Jabanga 9y ago
    I don't believe such hard forks will be practical when the ecosystem is larger and more diverse. The DAO happened in a unique point in Ethereum's history, when the community was very small (and thus cohesive) and activity on the network was very little.